November 2008 Newsletter
November 1, 2008
How do you keep your balance when times are tough? What keeps you calm? What helps you sleep? How do you move forward? We’ve assembled a few ideas to share with you.
However, the most important items are these:
It’s important.
Not The Loss Alone
Not the loss alone,
But what comes after.
If it ended completely
At loss, the rest
Wouldn’t matter.
But you go on.
And the world also.
And words, words
In a poem or song:
Aren’t they a stream
On which your feelings float?
Aren’t they also
The banks of that stream
And you yourself the flowing?
~ Gregory Orr ~
The Real Work
It may be that when we no longer know
what to do
we have come to our real work,
and that when we no longer know which
way to go
we have come to our real journey.
The mind that is not baffled is not
employed.
The impeded stream is the one that sings.
~ Wendell Berry ~
Thanksgiving Thoughts
If the only prayer you said in your whole life was, “thank you,” that would suffice. - Meister Eckhart
Thanksgiving, after all, is a word of action. - W.J. Cameron
What we’re really talking about is a wonderful day set aside on the fourth Thursday of November when no one diets. I mean, why else would they call it Thanksgiving? – Erma Brombeck
Optimism includes the assumption I can do something to change this situation for the better. Defeatism or pessimism includes the assumption probably nothing I do will make any difference. Of course, when you’re optimistic, you are more willing to take action to change things for the better, which increases the likelihood that things will change for the better. That’s how optimism becomes self-fulfilling. Pessimism can also become a self-fulfilling prophesy. If there is some area of your life that you have decided you cannot improve, you will no longer even try, which makes it more likely it will stay the way it is (or get worse). Optimism is not the same as thinking positively, and it is actually easier than thinking positively. But it has far more evidence from scientific experiments proving its effectiveness than positive thinking does.
by Adam Khan taken from www.youmeworks.com/selffulfillingprophesy.html
This Too Shall Pass
A lot of this might help you in your relationship, but when you try to sift out the most important, your ability to deal with conflict will be at or near the top of the list. Would you like to experience less conflict? Would you like to feel calmer during conflicts? Would you like to resolve them easier? Here’s how: Remember whatever is happening is temporary. There are several reasons this principle is so important.
When someone assumes her problem is permanent, it can lead to depression, according to Martin Seligman, one of the top researchers in his field. Assuming that something bad is permanent is one of the biggest contributors to the downward spiral of depression, and depression is the most common psychological problem people experience — and one of the most destructive.
Merely being disheartened is a mild form of depression. Although it’s milder, it happens more often. When you feel disheartened, you want to stop trying. This not only feels bad, it makes you less capable of dealing well with conflict.
Coming from an entirely different angle, Buddha tried to find out what caused suffering. By his own assessment, one of his most important findings is that when people fail to accept the temporary nature of things, they suffer more than they need to. According to Buddha (and I happen to agree with him on this), this lack of acceptance that things are temporary and always changing is one of the main sources of suffering for humanity.
When Abraham Lincoln was in the White House, he experienced stress, and that is an understatement if I’ve ever made one! Soldiers were getting slaughtered by the tens of thousands and Lincoln was the one sending them to their tragic deaths. He was a deeply empathetic man, so this tremendous slaughter caused him immense despair and sadness and pain. But it needed to be done, and decisions needed to be made every day. To keep himself calm enough to deal with it, he often said to himself, this too shall pass. He used this phrase as a kind of mantra. He was able to maintain his rationality and carry out his duties at a crucial time in history — largely by reminding himself again and again that whatever is happening is temporary.
This too shall pass. The one constant in this universe is that everything changes. Remind yourself of this and you’ll suffer less. You’ll get disheartened less often and less intensely. And — back to our original purpose — you’ll deal with conflict better.
Say that phrase to yourself next time you feel upset about something. Use it as a mantra. The circumstances that caused the upset will change — maybe not all of them, but some parts of your circumstances will change all by themselves fairly quickly. And remind yourself that your feelings will change inevitably, even if you do nothing to change them. You won’t stay upset forever. I know this is obvious to you now, but when you’re upset, you tend to forget this important truth.
It’s a simple idea, but it can dramatically ease the strain of the moment, making you better able to deal with it, creating less stress in your body, and making you a calmer person to interact with.
Say to yourself in times of stress: This too shall pass.
by Adam Khan taken from www.youmeworks.com/thistoo.html
I am generally a calm person. It’s my nature. Which brings to mind the question, is calmness a genetic predisposition, a choice, or a state of mind resulting from a variety of factors. People can remain clam in the midst of crisis, or chaos. Calmness doesn’t mean inactivity, it’s a state of mind. Here are a few ideas that come to mind to help with attaining clam.
- Turn off the TV at home, avoid news overload
- Choose music that soothes
- Get an indoor fountain you can hear, or environmental sound device, it works
- Don’t expect the worst to happen
- Consciously be quiet, and notice how it makes you feel
- Remember , you don’t always need to be right.
- Lean back, breathe deeply and concentrate on lowering energy levels
- See yourself in a quiet place, and go there mentally, anytime. Revisit the scene.
- Let the phone ring.
- Choose your battles wisely
- Put yourself in other’s places, don’t criticize
- Organize something at home
- Reduce caffeine and sugar in your diet, avoid junk food
- Have something to look forward to, and do it
- And think before you speak or according to Willie Nelson . . . “Never miss a good opportunity to shut up.”
~ Randy Meenach
A Few more Ideas to Promote a Sense of Calm and Well – Being
- Write in a gratitude journal
- Meditate or Pray
- Read a good novel
- Take a walk or a run
- Take up yoga or Tai Chi
- Help someone in trouble
- Take three DEEP breaths
~ Susan Reuling Furness